As you might recall , a redditor known as daymeeuhn paid way too much money for an early copy of No Man’s Sky . He then proceeded to post his experiences on Reddit, including videos and various descriptions of the game that weren’t all positive. Our lovely Mathew Hayes assured everyone we really shouldn’t be taking this daymeeuhn any more seriously than his bootleg copy of the game. I definitely agree – the game got a huge day one patch, so of course the patchless daymeeuhn encountered lots of bugs and exploitable glitches.
What we should be worried about, however, is the ruthless way daymeeuhn’s posts, and the reports about his post, have been taken down. The news show from Rooster Teeth, The Know, has been under the most recent attacks. Their video reporting the leaks was taken down hours after being posted, along with the reddit posts themselves. The posts were later moved to PornHub, if you really want to find them. This is frankly getting ridiculous. Especially in this case – The Know is simply reporting the facts and not wild rumors. The media should not be punished for the leaked information; do not shoot the messenger, as it were.
I thought, at first, that The Know was simply a victim of YouTube’s automated copyright system. It has been plaguing many channels, from The Angry Joe Show to Nostalgia Critc, with absolutely no response from YouTube to solve the problem. According to The Know, this isn’t the case. The copyright claim was entirely manual by Sony itself. This makes the situation a lot worse, as it is not the product of a broken system, but a conscious decision on Sony’s part.
Then Hello Games, the developers of No Man’s Sky , realized the mistake and released a statement saying that they are discussing the issue with Sony and working to put the videos back. Yet nothing has been heard from Sony. In my opinion, this situation never should have happened. Leaks happen all the time! It’s just a part of the internet world and the very function of news sites is to report on them. Attempting to stop them is like trying to stop a volcano from erupting. The information will get out there regardless of anyone’s best intentions. So why did Sony bother? Why are Hello Games trying to fix it and not Sony themselves? This is yet another example of news censorship, and it happens far too often.
Buy why? Where’s the copyright violation? The Know did not link to anything to do with the leak, whereas even CheatCC’s report did. The footage The Know used was from the reveal trailer and gameplay video officially released by the No Man’s Sky team. Frankly, there isn’t a difference. The Know is simply one of many gaming news organizations that reported on the link, some on YouTube, some in written form.
The only reasoning I can think of for these takedown notices is that Sony is quite suddenly going to start controlling its content as ruthlessly as Nintendo. But this doesn’t make sense either, since Sony hasn’t taken down leaked videos of other games (at least not enough to make headlines in the past few days). In addition, such a move would more than likely hurt Sony’s sales; many people look to game critics before buying a game and wouldn’t be willing to take the risk without them. Of course, such a risk is the least of the situation. Still, it’s not the media’s fault this information was leaked, and they should not be penalized for it.
If Sony does want to control its content this way, then the situation with The Know remains under the copyright law (though some would argue where the fair use is). If Sony does not, however, then this move rides straight into the censorship category rather than the copyright one. Censoring the media in this way, especially the news, is a gross violation of the freedom of speech. The Know and others are simply reporting on a leak. How the information was obtained: that is the responsibility of daymeeuhn, not the journalists reporting on it.
Though this is but one game, I sincerely worry for the future. Sony is usually rather understanding about such leaks, so why now? Why No Man’s Sky ? The game’s release was rumored to be delayed because of copyright issues, perhaps controlling this leak is Sony’s attempt at keeping those issues to a minimum. If that’s the case, the bootleg copy of the game should not have been leaked in the first place. Again, that responsibility falls on Sony, not reporters. The media should not be punished for the leaked information.